BBC News Profiles Old-School Brooklyn Billboard Company

The first sentence of the BBC intro page for Victoria Fritz’s fun story says it all:

BBC News has been looking at jobs around the world which used to be fairly commonplace but are now vanishing.

Don’t worry, guy at the newspaper printing press. Or… gal at the newspaper classified ads desk. This article isn’t, at least for today, about you. Rather, it’s about Colossal Media, a Brooklyn operation that has made a go of resurrecting the fine, lost art of hand-painted outdoor advertising.

Colossal VP Paul Lindahl told the BBC that the value of paying for painted illustrations on the side of NYC area buildings begins for clients before the illustration is completed:

“What makes us stand out is that our work is almost like a performance art,” he explained. “The people below get to see the painting unfold over the days that we are out there. They appreciate the creative element in the execution.”

Colossal probably never expected to be lumped together with Mexican organ grinders, Taiwanese noodle makers, India street typists(!), Nigerian indigo dryers and Spanish knife sharpeners. But they are, thanks to this ongoing BBC News series about “Vanishing Professions.” Read the rest of the article here.